It’s a common question at the start of projects; “If we’re going to do this well, it will need to satisfy ease-of-use for our customers. What kind of universal metrics can we apply?

There are no universal metrics for ease of use. Each product and project is different; what will define “ease of use” for a spoon is likely to fail to define “ease of use” for a digital camera.

You can define project-specific metrics. For example, if you were building an MP3 player you might have a target of “The user must be able to find and play their chosen song within 3 seconds of accessing the interface.” Or “A user must be able to pause play by any interaction with the interface so that they can deal with any interruption without having to find a pause button.”

Ease of Use and Commercial Reality

Ease of use cuts both ways and includes the impact that your work has on the business as a whole. This may mean compromises on the way through the design process to balance the demands of your user and your business.

Ease of Use and Functionality

While it is sometimes worth sacrificing functionality to provide ease of use, many products sacrifice ease of use for functionality.

Example: Smartphone cameras are incredibly simple to use and the mass market loves them. In contrast a DSLR such as those made by Canon, Nikon, Fuji, etc. offers a huge amount of control over the camera experience but it comes at the price of ease of use. You need to learn about lenses, about flash, about controlling aperture, shot speed, ISO, etc. And while there’s no denying that smartphones have many more users than DSLRs – there is still a very healthy market for DSLR cameras.